The Psychopath

                                                                                                                                                                

          Take a second and try to picture  your self living without a conscience. Try to imagine what it would be like to be totally void of emotion. Having no feeling of guilt or remorse, a totally lack of empathy for human life, or no sense of concern for your friends, strangers or even your family. Think about living without shame no matter what kind of callus, lazy, harmful, selfish or immoral the action you have taken or decision you have made. You’re probably wondering how on earth a person can live this way. The answer is that there are people who live like this they are called Psychopaths. Psychopathy is of the most extreme of all personality disorder that is known. This personality disorder is terrifying because psychopaths are individuals that are free from the internal restraint that helps normal a human being due the right thing. The most fascinating characteristic a psychopath possess is the ability to pretend or fake being normal in order to make all those around them believe that they are, when in actually they are far from normal.

           

            Psychopathy is a mental disorder that is mainly characterized by a total lack of empathy and remorse, very shallow emotions, egocentricity, and deceptiveness. Even though psychopaths lack empathy and emotional depth, they manage to pass off as a normal person by faking emotions and lying about their past. They have hair trigger tempers or poor behavior control. They tend to throw tantrums and revert to a calm state moments after. Psychopaths are very reactive to perceived insults. While most human beings are able to control their anger   or aggression since this ability is weak in psychopaths they will lash out violently.  Psychopaths also have a low tolerance for boredom they always need excitement or some of stimulation. Most psychopaths are impulsive they search for quick gratification and participate in high risk behaviors in order to feel something (wikipedia). When you have gone through your whole life without feeling anything or never feeling an emotion you will be more likely to engage in behaviors that make you feel some sort of emotion. Psychopaths search for gratification and high risk behaviors because it allows them to feel something whether it be an adrenaline rush or the excitement one may when they have had a close call with death. The key point to realize is that all of these symptoms or characteristic of psychopathy are hidden by the psychopath’s ability to appear outwardly normal.

             

        All psychopaths have a lack of empathy especially for human life. It seems like they cannot comprehend the emotional states of other human beings except in a logical sense. They can never feel something for someone else. For example if you feel happy or sad  a normal person would be able to feel happy or sad for you or be able to relate to you on some level, but a psychopath can never do that especially when a person is feeling pain or distress. It is because of this lack of empathy that psychopaths are can commit horrifying acts of cruelty on another human being and not feel any remorse. Because they cannot be provoked by the emotions of others psychopaths tend to believe that other people are nothing more than objects that are  there for their own personal amusement (psycho).

        

       Psychopaths are great lairs and manipulators. They will lie to get what they want or to impress people and they can lie with such mastery that sometimes even the most experienced police interrogators are fooled. They are great lairs because of how they present themselves. They present themselves in a way that is confident, and never show signs of anxiety, hesitation or shame like an ordinary person would. Even when they are caught in a lie they still maintain that confident presentation and try to retile their story so it can fit with their lies. Most psychopaths are out spoken and verbally lack sincerity or emotional depth when they speak. Psychopaths can be very amusing and very entertaining conversationalist and they are always ready to strike back with a claver comeback. They are very good at telling unlikely but very convincing stories that cast them in a positive light. Also they are very good at presenting themselves well and are often very likable and charming. These qualities make it very difficult for a person to see through a psychopath’s illusion of normalcy. Some psychopaths but not all have the ability to charm and to manipulate others. Psychopaths are extroverted, charming, dominant, and confident. They see other people as objects for their own personal use. Most psychopaths will take on a parasitic lifestyle and will con people out of their wealth and other resources. When a psychopath’s victim is no longer useful the psychopath will discard the victim like a piece of trash. Not all psychopaths are charming and master manipulators for some psychopaths due to their upbringing will not have the proper social grace and education to impress people and these types of psychopaths tend to get what they want through intimidation, coercion, and violence.

            Psychopaths are a nightmare for a psychiatrist to threat. Even the most skilled and the most knowledgeable psychiatrist can easily be deceived by the psychopath’s appearance of being normal. The treatment options in the psychiatrist arsenal to treat psychopathy are extremely limited. Because there is no cure for psychopathy there is no pill or medicine that a psychopath can take that will instill a conscience or empathy. Psychotherapy is useless because the psychopaths that go through psychotherapy emerge from it even more dangerous and commit even more heinous crimes then they did before therapy.  Because as a result of therapy psychopaths have a better understanding of themselves and other people, and this allows them to strengthen their illusion of being normal and make them even more skilled at manipulating people.

            The great play write William Shakespeare once said that “all the world’s a stage, and all the men and women are merely players.” For the psychopath the world is one giant stage and they are just and actor that plays many parts. Psychopaths hide behind a mask of sanity, they hide in plain sight, they pretend to be normal, they pretend to have a conscience but they do not. Psychopaths put on a show for the whole world to see every day of their lives and they are hard to spot. You may have dated a psychopath or be friends or be related to one and not even know it. You could be with one right now and have no idea that a monster lives within them.